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Thursday, January 8, 2015

Love Came Down

This post was originally published on Catholic365.com

“This I
command you, to love one another.” (John 15:17)

It is said that when the Apostle John was living in Ephesus in
his old age he would often address the church there with the same simple
exhortation, “My little children, love one another.” The elders of the
community, tired of hearing the same repeated message, would press John to
share with the church some great insight about Jesus or being a disciple. John
would double-down by telling them that these simple words were the commands of
Jesus, and if they had nothing else of the Gospel to truly live these words
would be enough.

Love is hard, at least the kind of love that Jesus spoke of,
modeled and expected of his disciples. “This is my commandment, that you love
one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that he
should lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:12-13) This is the love
that God is calling each of us to, and it is the only kind of love that can
truly change the world. This is the love that each person who calls himself
“Christian” is called to live by, and it is not easy.

Consider St. Paul’s reflection on this kind of love: “Love is
patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.
Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does
not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things,
believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (1 Cor. 13:4-6)
This is nothing less than the job description for being a Christian.
Unfortunately, it is not how many Christians consistently live—including me. We
are too often consumed with being right than being patient, kind, and humble.
Perhaps we allow fear to keep us from fully loving. The two cannot co-exist for
“perfect love casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18)

I think this is why Pope Francis is so easily misunderstood,
because he is calling the Church to the way of love, and that way is messy.
This is not to say that love is not concerned with truth, or that love is a
blank check for sin or error. But love is patient. It is patient with the
sinner. It is patient with the error. Love does not insist; it invites. I heard
someone say that Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI had as the hallmarks
of their papacies the virtues of hope and faith respectively. They provided the
emphasis and leadership the Church needed in navigating the turbulent
post-conciliar waters. They gave the Church a Catechism and a reformed
liturgical life to enrich our hearts and minds. They cared for the flock of the
Church. (Note: I’m not saying JPII or Benedict weren’t loving, or didn’t care
about love, etc. I am saying that their papacies had certain thematic elements
in their preaching & writing that emphasized hope & faith.)

Pope Francis as caused a stir, not because he has changed the
message, but because he has changed the audience and the emphasis. The 99 have
been cared for and feed and built up for the last 40 years, now it is time for
the shepherds to go looking for the lost sheep. Francis is calling the Church,
firmly rooted in knowledge of what we believe, to go out and to love the world.
Love is the most powerful weapon the Church has against her enemies. Love is
the most faithful way of imitating Christ. It is the very reason he came.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.”
(John 3:16)

“God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners
Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

This is when love is tested most. We live in a world that does
not love, that does not know the meaning of love. Our world has twisted true,
sacrificial love “that does not insist on its own way” into mere sentiment
driven by seeking whatever brings the most self-pleasure. We are told that we
are living in the midst of a culture war and that good Christians must stand
and fight the good fight. We want to take up arms in the battle for morality
and decency, but Jesus calls us to lay down our lives and surrender in love.
Only by freely, unconditionally loving one another, even our “enemies”, can we
ever hope to spread the joy of the Gospel. In the words of St. Paul, “Do you
not realize that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?” (Romans
2:4)

The glorious truth of Christmas is that God chose to love us and
give himself to us when we were his “enemies”. The Incarnation demonstrated the
absolute and perfect love of God for us, and challenges us to love others in
the same way. Too often, and from good intentions, we put too much emphasis on
fighting sins and not enough on simply loving people where they are. Disciples
aren’t made by first ridding their lives of their sins and bad habits, but
rather by first encountering the love of God in Christ Jesus. That encounter
with love is what inspires them to turn from their sins. Listen to the words of
Pope Francis:

“On the lips of the catechist the first
proclamation must ring out over and over: “Jesus Christ loves you; he gave his
life to save you; and now he is living at your side every day to enlighten,
strengthen and free you.” This first proclamation
is called “first” not because it exists at the beginning and can then be
forgotten or replaced by other more important things. It is first in a
qualitative sense because it is the principal proclamation, the one which we
must hear again and again in different ways, the one which we must announce one
way or another throughout the process of catechesis, at every level and
moment.” (The Joy of the Gospel #164, emphasis added)

No one wants to reform his life for a stranger. No one will
change her ways for someone she doesn’t know. But for love, many men and women
will do great things for their beloved. Think of Jesus at the well with the
Samaritan woman. What if he had begun his conversation with a discourse on the
sanctity of marriage? Would that woman have really heard Christ and had her
life changed? By reaching out to her in love Jesus opened the door to her heart
first by showing that he cared for her.

Yes, God hates sin. We should hate sin. However, the sin we are
called to hate is primarily the sin in our lives. It’s interesting that “hate”
can be found 36 times in the New Testament (most in reference to
Christ/Christians being hated, or commands not to hate others) while “love”
appears 261 times. All too often Christians are so busy hating the sin that we
often forget to first love the sinner.

What would it look like if we decided to look less at the sin in
others and pour out all of our energy in simply loving others, especially those
who could be considered our enemies? What if we stopped caring about being
right and just cared for people, especially those least like us? Converts to
the early Church were won over by the love of Christians, not merely by
theological debate. Christianity conquered a culture of violence, sex,
hedonism, and pantheism by the witness of love. They followed the admonition of
Jesus to love one another and to be known to all by that love. That is our
calling. That is our challenge. That is the only way to win the world for
Jesus.

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about me

I'm Tom Ponchak. I received a degree in theology from the Franciscan University of Steubenville. After graduation I worked as a parish youth minister in Maryland and a high school religion teacher in Michigan.
In 1997, my wife and I left the Catholic Church and joined the Association of Vineyard Churches, a non-denominational, evangelical faith community. I was the founding pastor of Matthew's House Vineyard in central Florida.
After ten years away from Catholicism, and longing for the Eucharist, I returned to the Church in 2006. I am currently the Director of Adult Faith Formation at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel parish in Indiana. I am also a member of the Domestic expression of the Brothers and Sisters of Charity.